Mercenaries
by TheCookieJarGroup
Summary: Only ever do what you're paid to do. No more.


"You sure you've given this the required amount of thought?"  
The visible eye looking down into Fox's isn't exactly condescending, more quizzical.

Fox shrugs, shows off one of his goofiest-looking grins. The one that he knows makes Wolf smile. Falling into that one deep red-purple eye forever. "I'm a mercenary, just like you, Wolf. We're not so different."

Wolf rolls his eyes, one real, averting Fox's gaze. The other, electronic, flashing plasma green under the eyepatch. "I get the feeling you aint takin' this seriously."

Fox snorts. Resting his head against his lover's soft, warm chest. Almost snuggling, though not quite. "You underestimate me, Wolf."

"How much is the Cornerian job payin' again?"

"Six hundred thousand credits. Those stingy assholes."

"And the Venomian job is payin' 600,500. You'll blow more than that on gas alone."

"And not have to deal with General Pepper!" Fox exclaims, eyes closed as he smiles.

"Yeah, right. Hero of the Great Lylat War, defender of Corneria."

Fox shrugs. "Being a hero's great and all that, Wolf. But remember. I'm a true mercenary at heart. A *Lone Wolf*, if you will. Savage."

Fox makes a growling sound, playful, deep in his throat and vibrations transmitting. Wolf snickers, with sincere and honest sentiment. Brings up a hand to ruffle the white patch of hair atop the younger soldier's head. Soft, almost downy. Like a baby kit's.

Wolf wouldn't have imagined this happening, not in a thousand eons, had you asked him in two years ago in the midst of the Great Lylat War. On the same bed, next to - rather, against - the one he'd considered his most terrible rival.

"So," Wolf says softly, "When we were up there in the air, shootin' at each other. Tryn'ta blow each other's brains out. It was just a matter of credits, huh."

"War's war," Fox repeats. "Peace is peace. It wasn't against you, it was just what I had to do. As a mercenary. We're just lucky we got to know each other better, during peacetime. While it lasted, of course."

"And you'd be up there now, tryn'ta kill me again. If Pepper paid ya enough."

"Yeah," Fox sighs. Dreamily. Warm in Wolf's fuzzy forearms and chest and stomach.

"Yeah, right," Wolf thinks. Or maybe sighs. Or maybe, whispers gently and warmly into his lover's ear. "Yeah… right." 

* * *

Intergalactic war is much like a symphony.  
It's bombastic and there's beauty in the destructiveness from afar.

Reminiscent of fireworks in how these flashes of light seem to bloom from a distance, but the counted lives cost at such an outburst of energy really solidifies the grim atmosphere on the field.  
So it is and so it has been done, time and time again.

To inspect further upon the intricacies of the lives taken and those taking away, we examine Fox McCloud.  
Fox is fighting the same war on the side he has never fought it before. 

* * *

"Atta fucker!" Fox yells, pounding fist into control panel. Destroyed ships don't sink or rise in space, they simply continue along their previous trajectory, without acceleration nor deceleration. Mathematical equations, velocity prior to collision plus velocity of impacting body. "Got him!"

Wolf does not hear this. Or at least, chooses not to acknowledge what may or may not have been perceived. The cockpit of Wolfen is unbearably hot, ventilation inexistent. Cold claws grip tight around controls, like a voice onto prayer.

Correcting, in his toughened veteran brain, for the trajectory. The course warped by the damage on the wing: loss of the previously engineered symmetry. For compensation, he cranks up the output of one engine only, manually. Overriding AI, autopilot is trash, burn in hell to the asshole engineers who designed this shit and who knew nothing about real flying and burning and crashing -

\- like his people. His people burning and crashing on the cold dry earth of Venom -

"I GOT HIM! WOLF!"

Almost a plea now, that voice. Not a soldier's, but a child's, at this distance plus distortion in the comm. channel. Humidity forms a film of fog against diamond-grade windshield, Wolf takes note, Wolf takes note of many things. Shield percentage is dropping to thirty-six - but do not trust AI, compensate for its optimism, reduce by twenty percent in other words one-fifth of thirty six -

"WOLF-"

* * *

"I can never sleep the day before shipping off," Fox says, his voice trailing off as he stares at the ceiling.

"Yeah?" Wolf yawns, rolling over onto his side, turning away from him. "I can."

Fox doesn't take the cue. "Why do you think that is?"

An audible sigh. "Why what is?"

"Why do you think I can't sleep? The day before shipping off to war, I mean. I've done it dozens of times. Since I was sixteen. And still, the night before I go off to a new job, I can't sleep. Why is that?"

"You're excited," Wolf says, adjusting his hold on the pillow on which his head rests. "Or nervous. Or both."

"You'd think I'd be used to it by now."

"You're keeping yourself awake with your thoughts," Wolf grunts. "Stop thinking so much and get your ass to sleep."

"What are your thoughts?"

"I aint got no thoughts. That's why I'm able to get to sleep. Stop thinking. Go to sleep."

"That's impossible," Fox says, exasperated.

"Impossible or not, maybe try and keep quiet so those thoughts don't keep the both of us up?"

Fox ignores this as well. "It's not just me thinking. It's different somehow. Something new to the equation I can't quite put my finger on."

"Maybe you're worried about potentially fighting your old teammates. What're them called? The Star Fox Team? Actually, are they still called The Star Fox Team? That's gotta be fuckin' weird."

"Nawh, see, Star Fox days are gone and done," Fox says, tracing a line up and down his own chest in the darkness of the room. Eyes searching the shadows. "Slippy's a full-time mechanic now. He probably won't fly ever again. Peppy's probably retired. And Falco? That chump couldn't pilot his way out of a wet paper bag. He'd be too scared to break through the paper. He'd live, but he wouldn't get out of that paper bag before the fight was over."

"You do realize he's not gonna be piloting around inside of a giant paper bag, right?" Wolf says, looking over his shoulder.

"It's a metaphor, Wolf. Like an imaginary example of something."

"I know what a goddamn metaphor is, Fox," he says, rolling back over. "I just dunno that you did."

"Anyway, I got you, right? That's all I need."

Fox's comment is met with silence as he stares into the darkness in the ceiling's direction. He wonders if he shouldn't have said that, and he wonders why he wonders that.

Fox doesn't get much sleep on this night.

* * *

"WOLF-"

Frustrated with the distraction, Wolf tears off the earpiece and tosses it to his feet.  
His eyes drifting back from that marked team member with some ill-perceived comfort.

A heavy sigh as he internally locks onto his next target. There's a tinge of something that distracts him for a fraction of a second, but he doubles down.  
Forcing the controls forward using a boost and a barrel roll to flawlessly destroy an Arwing and spiral through the wreckage.

The wide eyes of a terrified amphibious creature reminds him of something he wouldn't want to think about if he'd taken the time to acknowledge it before the poor excuse for an existence paints its torn open cockpit like an imploded water balloon.

Wolf curses to himself. He's losing focus.

A deftly fired shot of plasma laser into the distance, and - there it is, another flower of smoke. Thank god for the electronic eye, transmitting information from radars directly to his brain. Bypassing the clumsy mechanics of the flesh.

Doing all he can to ignore the flurry of Cornerian ships veering off to his seven. The ship of Fox McCloud blinking on his radar at his eight, diving deeper into the chaos.

Fuck, yelled to no one as a red plasma beam nicks him nearly from above, or maybe it was below? Hard push of the control stick pushing the nose of his ship sideways, out of the way.

Scattered dots on the radar grouping into a cluster at his seven, was that a second wave of missiles coming from his nine?

Wolf turns, sharply, veering the opposite direction of the fray, catapulting himself behind a group of meteors. An explosion nearby alerts him as chunks of shattered meteor spray against the tail of his ship. He takes one sharp breath in, then another. It could be coming anytime now, the second blast, the one that would send him to his starry grave.

Maybe a whole second passes. In it, a universe expands and contracts. The anticipated blast does not come. Wolf almost whimpers in relief. And then, he smiles. The pilot is playing with him. The old game of cat and mouse. Familiar. Just as how he had once played in another war... 

* * *

"Since I can't sleep and you can't sleep….." Fox trails off, turning his head in the darkness towards the general direction of Wolf. The shadows hiding the redness crawling up his cheeks.

"I can sleep just fine without you talkin' at me and wakin' me up," Wolf says, half asleep. Shifting one leg and then another. "It's you seems to be havin' the problem."

"I was thinking, y'know," Fox continues, not paying attention to Wolf. Still tracing his own chest with his finger. His voice different from the way it usually is. Softer, gentler. Coy. "Last chance and all. Before we like, blow up in space or something."

Eventually, Wolf will give him an answer. But for now, he tosses his head back, and looks again over his shoulder. Just in case. 

* * *

Well, Wolf'll play this game all right, with the Cornerian pilot. Eyes set on the culprit on his radar, the solo ship appearing from his twelve. Weeding out from his consciousness that faraway cluster of red flashes, zeroing in on their target at his seven. At last, Wolf thinks as thrill surges within him. At last, a worthy opponent.

Wolf steadies himself. Cannons spray from both ships, their trajectories colliding and annulling mid-space. Wolf gracefully spirals through the fallout, gauging his enemy's patterns and leading appropriately.

Pushing forward to meet him more as an obstacle in the path of the opposition. Just a little more push, just a little more pull, and… A fully charged beam hits its target straight on, bull's eye, ha, never misses a mark when he put himself to it, ha, HA!

The Wolfen twists out of the way of the destruction in close proximity, narrowly avoiding the beams still flowing out of disintegrating enemy cannons, and space debris. Heart pounding with the thrill of victory. Except, why then does he feel so detached, listless?

A tracer of light from Wolf's peripherals catches his attention despite the fact that he explicitly instructs it otherwise internally. Is that the source of his distraction?

Fingers and palms tightening around the controls uncomfortably for a brief fraction of a second.

Wolf shakes off a chill running down his spine and ignores the other cloud of dust now blooming in the distance. Because he is a mercenary and that's all it is.

A silent cloud of dust in the distance.


End file.
